Event 569

Subject Areas – Biology, Life Sciences

Thursday 2 June 2016, 4.30pm
Venue: Compass

Please drop in to our new Compass venue, quiz leading academics about their subject and engage in some critical thinking. As part of Hay Festival 2016 and with help from the Welsh Government we have invited a range of university lecturers and speakers to drop in, talk about their subject areas and about university life.

Kathelijne Koops is post-doctoral researcher at the University of Zurich and a visiting researcher at Harvard University.

Event 331

A Monstrous Commotion: The Mysteries of Loch Ness

Thursday 2 June 2016, 5.30pm
Venue: Llwyfan Cymru - Wales Stage

The Loch Ness monster: a creature that should have died out with the dinosaurs, or a legend built on hoaxes and wishful thinking? The Bristol professor teases out the threads of one of the most popular mysteries of the past hundred years. Chaired by Martin Chilton.

Event 332

Origins: The Scientific Story of Creation

Thursday 2 June 2016, 5.30pm
Venue: Good Energy Stage

There are many different versions of our creation story. Baggott tells the version according to modern science. Using a cross-disciplinary approach, he starts with the Big Bang and travels right up to the emergence of humans as conscious intelligent beings, 13.8 billion years later. Chaired by Dan Davis.

Event 333

Aftershock: The Untold Story of Surviving Peace

Thursday 2 June 2016, 5.30pm
Venue: Oxfam Moot

Over the past decade, we have sent thousands of people to fight on our behalf. But what happens when these soldiers come back home, having lost their friends and killed their enemies, having seen and done things that have no place in civilian life? Through wide-ranging interviews with former combatants, the war correspondent tells the story of our veterans’ journey from the frontline to the reality of return and asks: why do people who are trained to thrive within the theatre of war so often find themselves ill-prepared for peace? He talks to Jamie Hacker Hughes, the PTSD and trauma specialist, Visiting Professor of Military Psychology at Anglia Ruskin University.

Event 334

The Gwyn Jones Event - Roald Dahl: Wales of the Unexpected

Thursday 2 June 2016, 5.30pm
Venue: Cube

Contributors to a ground-breaking new book, RoaldDahl: Wales of the Unexpected, discuss the vital presence of Wales in the work of ‘the world’s number one storyteller’. This is Dahl wonderfully defamiliarised in his centenary year through the lens of the country of his birth and early life.

Presented by The Welsh Academy

This event has taken place

In association with Literature Wales and Dahl 100

Event 335

Social Media: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

Thursday 2 June 2016, 5.30pm
Venue: Starlight Stage

The impact of social media on society today is undeniable - sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Linkedin have millions and even billions of users. Nurse, an academic at Oxford's Department of Computer Science, considers the positive uses of social-media information, while also explaining the various security and privacy risks associated with having a digital footprint. Shedding light on what social media is, as well as how it works, he will show how to understand what you are telling the world when you join in with social media, and how to recognise good information from bad, as a reader.

13+

Suitable for 13+ years.

This event has taken place

In association with the Department of Computer Science at The University of Oxford

Event 570

Subject Areas – Physics, Astronomy, Maths, Cosmology

Thursday 2 June 2016, 5.30pm
Venue: Compass

Please drop in to our new Compass venue, quiz leading academics about their subject and engage in some critical thinking. As part of Hay Festival 2016 and with help from the Welsh Government we have invited a range of university lecturers and speakers to drop in, talk about their subject areas and about university life.

Bangalore Sathyaprakesh is a professor at the School of Physics and Astronomy at Cardiff University.

15+

This event has taken place

Event 336

A Lover Sings

Thursday 2 June 2016, 7pm
Venue: Tata Tent

Bragg is one of Britain’s most distinctive and accomplished songwriters, whose work has articulated the passions, both personal and political, of Britain during the past five decades. A new collection of his lyrics, A Lover Sings, reveals a unique sensibility: principled and proudly of the Left, funny, forthright and tender. He talks to Sarfraz Manzoor.

Event 337

The Dream Team

Thursday 2 June 2016, 7pm
Venue: Telegraph Stage

Hilarious and surreal, McGough is a poet of many voices. Menace and melancholy there may be, but with plenty of McGough’s characteristic wit and wordplay, too. His newest collection of comical verse, perfect for Hay, is It Never Rains. He is joined by the brilliantly inventive three-piece band that has enjoyed huge success around the world with its settings of poetry. Little Machine are the musicians, composers and writers Walter Wray, Steve Halliwell and Chris Hardy.

This event has taken place

Sponsored by TotalProduce

Event 338

Menagerie: The History of Exotic Animals in England

Thursday 2 June 2016, 7pm
Venue: Good Energy Stage

From Henry III’s elephant at the Tower to George IV’s love affair with Britain’s first giraffe and Lady Castlereagh’s recalcitrant ostriches, Grigson’s tour through the centuries amounts to an impressively detailed history of exotic animals in Britain. On the way we encounter a host of fascinating and outlandish creatures, including the first peacocks and popinjays, Thomas More’s monkey and Lord Clive’s zebra, which refused to mate with a donkey until it was painted with stripes. It is also the story of all those who came into contact with them: the people who owned them, the merchants who bought and sold them, the seamen who carried them to our shores, the naturalists who wrote about them, the artists who painted them, the itinerant showmen who worked with them, and the collectors who collected them. Grigson is now an honorary professor at the UCL Institute of Archaeology. Chaired by John Mitchinson.

Event 339

Cambridge Series 16: Planetary Vistas, the Landscapes of Other Worlds

Thursday 2 June 2016, 7pm
Venue: Llwyfan Cymru - Wales Stage

Recent advances in space exploration imaging have allowed us now to see landscapes never before possible. Murdin shows some of the greatest views and vistas of Mars, Venus’s Titan, Io and more in their full glory. Towering cliffs, icy canyons: the scenery is out of this world; all captured with the latest technology by landing and roving vehicles or by very low-flying spacecraft. Murdin is Senior Fellow Emeritus at the Institute of Astronomy at Cambridge.

This event has taken place

In association with Cambridge University

Event 340

Finding Love in the Countryside

Thursday 2 June 2016, 7pm
Venue: Oxfam Moot

Discover the good, the bad and intriguing world of online dating and rural matchmaking with Farmer Wants a Wife presenter Catherine Gee. Duncan Cunningham is founder of The Dating Lab, which has launched dozens of dating sites including Country Living Magazine’s own country-loving.co.uk. After seeing tens of thousands of dating profiles he knows the difference between eye-catching and off-putting. Country Living columnist and author Imogen Green, has written extensively about her personal experience of rural romance and will share her highlights and low points. Followed by a drinks reception to chat to the speakers and meet like-minded country singletons. Who knows where it might lead?

Event 341

Tackling Climate Change with Technology – Good Energy Series

Thursday 2 June 2016, 7pm
Venue: Cube

New technology with the potential to reduce and mitigate our impact on the environment is emerging on every scale from the global to the domestic. Geo-engineering could counteract climate change by intervening in Earth’s natural systems, while new consumer technology offers greener cars and smarter homes. What are the latest ideas? And which technologies will be the most effective at securing a sustainable future? Mark Shorrock is the CEO of Tidal Lagoon Power. Davenport is CEO of Good Energy.

This event has taken place

In association with Good Energy

Event 342

Single Spies

Thursday 2 June 2016, 7pm
Venue: Starlight Stage

Thrilling new tales of espionage from two emerging stars of the genre. An unlikely hero dives into the chaotic madness of Russia and Georgia’s deadly covert conflict, in a rapid-fire tale of corporate espionage gone awry in Morgan Jones’ The Searcher. Will Flemyng, the hero of Naughtie’s Paris Spring, is an embassy man caught up in the évenements of April 1968. For 11 years Morgan Jones worked at the world’s largest business intelligence agency. He advised Middle Eastern governments, Russian oligarchs, New York banks, London hedge funds and African mining companies. Naughtie presented the Today programme on BBC Radio 4 for 21 years, interrogating lots of the people Morgan Jones worked for. They talk to Georgina Godwin.

Event DT9

Thursday Dinner

Thursday 2 June 2016, 7pm
Venue: Relish Festival Restaurant

Book a seat in the Relish Festival Restaurant and receive a free drink on us.

Enjoy a delicious meal from our Festival Restaurant buffet. Choose from a wide selection of hot and cold dishes created fresh on site by our team of chefs using the best local seasonal produce. You can view the menu online here.

Come up to the buffet and choose as much as you like from all the dishes on offer for just £20.

By booking online or by phone you will receive a complimentary glass of wine, bottle of beer or soft drink, and guarantee your seat in the restaurant where our team will be waiting to give you a warm welcome.

Alex Gooch breads and water are free for every customer, with a selection of desserts to choose from as well as a full bar and barista coffees.

This event has taken place

Event 514

Thursday 2 June 2016, 7.30pm
Venue: BBC Tent

Tom Price invites some of the UK's best comedians, actor and musicians along to the studio to take a look at the week that's just gone by. There'll be music, jokes and silliness as they throw a wrap party for the seven days that have just passed. This week we're in Hay-On-Wye as part of The Hay Festival, and helping us take a look at the week's news will be special guests Yasmine Akram ('Sherlock') and Clint Edwards ('The Rhod Gilbert Show').

Broadcast on BBC Radio Wales on Friday 3 June at 6.30pm

Under 16s must be accompanied by an adult over 18 years

Free but ticketed

This event has taken place

Event 343

Navigating Tensions of Life in Iran

Thursday 2 June 2016, 8.30pm
Venue: Good Energy Stage

Sariolghalam is Professor of International Relations at Tehran’s Shahid Beheshti University and is one of Iran’s best-selling authors. For 26 years he has taught and conducted research on contemporary history and Iran’s relations with the outside world. His acknowledged skill has been to find ways to navigate Iran’s red lines in public discourse, and to avoid being targeted for being outspoken in print. The political establishment not only tolerated his writings, it has also been influenced by them. And Iran’s next generation views them as having helped to frame the 2015 nuclear agreement and expectations for the future.

Event 344

Chasing Einstein: the Story of the Discovery of Gravitational Waves – Cardiff University Series

Thursday 2 June 2016, 8.30pm
Venue: Starlight Stage

One hundred years ago Einstein predicted the esoteric phenomena of gravitational waves. Last September they were directly detected for the first time, from the violent collision of two black holes. That event marked the beginning of a new chapter in our study of the cosmos. Cardiff University scientists heavily involved in the LIGO project (Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory) will discuss the experience of making this landmark observation, the incredible science and fascinating personal stories behind it, and what it means for the future of our understanding of the universe. The speakers are both based at the School of Physics and Astronomy. The event is chaired by their colleague Professor Haley Gomez.

This event has taken place

In association with Cardiff University

Event 345

How Quickly can we Change… the Built Environment?

Thursday 2 June 2016, 8.30pm
Venue: Cube

We are locked in by our buildings, roads and homes, and the high, unsustainable energy use they depend on. Lindsay Mackie of the New Weather Institute; Howard Johns, author of The Energy Revolution and author Andrew Simms discuss how we can instigate the transformational change required to make our homes and cities viable in the future.